How to Craft an Agile Marketing Campaign

Meticulously designed marketing campaigns are a relic. As research on disruption and market transitions suggests, you’re better off these days if you can quickly identify and adapt to changes in your environment. Sure, you can anticipate multiple outcomes, with branching if-then plans and hypothetical scenarios — but those plans are only as effective as events are predictable. It’s extremely difficult to say how long current trends will remain significant — innovative technologies are popping up faster than we can forecast — and it’s impossible to tell which new trends could emerge during your campaign and thwart your efforts.

So marketers must develop the same mind-set and skills that allow agile tech and product-development teams to manage complex projects with many unknowns and moving parts. Here are some recommendations for doing that.

Think “outline,” not “campaign.” If you chart your campaign in such detail that it’s unalterable, you run the risk of being pinned down when something unexpected arises.

For the perfectionists out there, this may be a frightening thought. Many marketers have built their careers on following a series of highly detailed plans based on copious data. You still can, and should, draw on customer research, but leave room for growth. Map out your starting point, in as much detail as you wish, and then roughly outline your vision for the first few milestones in your campaign, keeping your plans tenuous and easy to adjust.

Consider this sample outline, from a firm that was launching a new clothing line.

Phase I (Weeks 1-4): Announcements and Initial Advertising

Submit press release detailing new clothing line and reinforce through social media.

Go live with new clothing products on the e-commerce platform, and schedule the release of images and links on social profiles.

Add banner to homepage, showcasing our new fleece-lined jacket, projected to be our top seller.

Initiate e-mail blasts to current customers, first announcing the new product line, then introducing discounted offers in subsequent weeks.

Introduce weekly articles, each highlighting a new product, and syndicate through social media.

Reach out through other advertising channels: magazines, direct mail, TV

Phase III (Weeks 9-12): Introduce and Promote Sale on New Products

Phase IV (Week 13): Analyze and Regroup

Note that the first phase of launch is outlined in detail, while subsequent phases are described in broad strokes. This allows you to measure impact and determine whether to keep going, make adjustments, or scrap what you’ve got and start over. The clothing company found that its fleece-lined jacket was underperforming and quickly substituted another product for it. The PPC ads were carrying significant traffic, but not converting, so in Phase II those were replaced with a direct-mail campaign.

Start small. It’s also good to plan modestly at the start and gradually become more ambitious, as you test the waters — especially if you’re venturing into a new channel. For example, if you’re going to run a series of pay-per-click advertisements, begin with a budget of only a few hundred dollars. Run it for a few weeks, analyze your results, and if you’ve been successful, increase your budget. This way, if a more attractive medium comes along — or if an unexpected obstacle interferes with your campaign — you’ll have a chance to make adjustments or bail out before you’ve spent too much money.

The same rule applies to scope. You might restrict your efforts at first and ramp up when your audience grows.

Take breaks. As you venture forth, pause frequently to reevaluate your position. If you’ve sketched out a minimalistic outline, you might do this when you get to each loosely defined milestone. Review the effectiveness of your current efforts, including projected profitability. Determine what changes have occurred in your environment, such as new competitors, technologies, or trends. And then tweak your strategy.

To carry out these recommendations, you have to pay close attention to your surroundings. Regularly visit industry news sites to stay on top of developments and consider how they could affect your marketing plans. Watch what your competitors are publishing and how well-received their ideas are. Keep in close touch with your target audiences, as well — conduct regular user surveys and measure how existing and potential customers interact with your brand. Track behavior on your website, through social sharing, and in reviews and comments. How are people’s priorities changing? What new tools are they using to make their lives easier? Adopt new trends early, and drop them when they appear to decline in relevance.

Agility doesn’t come naturally. You have to be at peace with the fact that, more often than not, you can’t predict what’s coming next. But this is a skill you can cultivate through awareness and practice. And really, to survive, you don’t have a choice.

Jayson DeMers is the founder and CEO of AudienceBloom, a Seattle-based content marketing and social media agency. Follow him on Twitter @jaysondemers.